System and method for managing advertising content delivery in a gaming environment supporting aggregated demographics serving and reporting

ABSTRACT

A method of in game advertising wherein in game advertising spots are registered from different video games having similar demographic characteristics. The in game advertising spots are then grouped together into an aggregated community of advertising spots. An advertising campaign then delivers advertising content to the group of advertising spots as if the group were a single advertising spot.

REFERENCE TO PRIOR APPLICATION

This application claims benefit from U.S. Provisional Patent Application Nos. 60/636,027 filed Dec. 15, 2004; and 60/636,112 filed Dec. 16, 2004, the entire contents of which is incorporated herein by reference.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The instant invention relates generally to providing advertising content via the Internet, and more particularly to systems and methods for managing advertising content delivery in an on-line gaming environment.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

During recent years, on-line computer gaming has gained increasing popularity, and today thousands of players are playing on-line all around the world. Predictably, interactive on-line computer gaming has blurred the line between games and other entertainment or communication media, and the avenues explored in the development of on-line gaming might well break new ground for interactive Internet applications in all areas of business relations and social life.

Due to their dynamic nature and specific appeal to certain audiences, computer games and especially games played on Internet enabled platforms provide the ideal vehicle for Internet advertising. Not only is it possible for an advertiser to directly target a specific group of customers, but also advertisements can be directly incorporated into the computer games, enabling something similar to the well-known concept of product placement.

It would therefore be highly advantageous to have at hand a system for effectively combining the two concepts elucidated above, and thus building a bridge from the advertising world to the world of computer gaming.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

It is an object of at least one embodiment of the instant invention to provide a method of aggregating at least one of advertising content and advertising spots into aggregated communities.

In accordance with an aspect of the instant invention there is provided a method comprising: providing a plurality of in game advertising spots from different video games having similar demographic characteristics; grouping the plurality of in game advertising spots together into an aggregated community of advertising spots; and, delivering a same advertising content for display within each of the advertising spots within the aggregated community of advertising spots.

In accordance with the invention there is provided a method comprising: registering a plurality of advertising spots from each of a plurality of video games, each advertising spot registered with data relating to an advertising spot format and demographic data relating to the video game in which the advertising spot is; forming a database of advertising spots, each advertising spot searchable based on the demographic data and the advertising spot format; and, searching the database to identify advertising spots having demographic data with a predetermined range.

In accordance with yet another aspect of the invention there is provided a method comprising: providing a plurality of in game advertising content from different advertisers requesting similar demographic characteristics; grouping the plurality of in game advertising content together into an aggregated advertising campaign; and, delivering different advertising content for display within a same video game advertising spot to, in aggregate, fill an advertising campaign.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Embodiments of the instant invention will now be described in conjunction with the following drawings, in which:

FIG. 1 shows a simplified flow diagram of a method of delivering an advertisement from within a video game;

FIG. 2 shows a method of aggregating advertising spots within video games;

FIG. 3 shows a simplified flow diagram of a method of aggregating advertising spots from within different video games and supporting custom aggregation;

FIG. 4 shows a simplified flow diagram of a method of aggregating advertising spots from within different video games and supporting custom aggregation;

FIG. 5 shows a simplified flow diagram of advertising campaign billing; and,

FIG. 6 shows a simplified flow diagram of advertising campaign billing;

FIG. 7 shows a simplified flow diagram of a method of approving content for use within an aggregation;

FIG. 8 shows a simplified flow diagram of a method of approving content for use within an aggregation;

FIG. 9 shows a method for running a plurality of advertising campaigns across a plurality of aggregations; and,

FIG. 10 shows a simplified block diagram of a network.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF EMBODIMENTS OF THE INVENTION

In an on-line advertisable gaming environment an advertiser provides advertising content for display to a client, specifically a gamer. An advertising service provider (ADSP) facilitates this process by making available advertisements to fill spots within a game instance for presenting the advertising content to the client. Each time advertising content is presented within a spot, an impression is counted. As part of a larger ad campaign, the advertiser optionally groups together different content and different spots, and optionally the spots are spread across more than one game platform. As is common in conventional forms of advertising, the ad campaign usually includes specified financial and time constraints.

In any advertising medium careful targeting of the marketing campaign can greatly influence the effectiveness and success of such efforts. In the gaming world, there are in the order of thousands of games from which a gamer can choose. Although there are a small number of dominant games with large market share, there are a host of smaller reach games that are very valuable due to their more targeted demographics. Unfortunately, each game has a small reach and, as such, is unsuitable to many larger advertising campaigns. By combining a plurality of advertising spots from a plurality of different games in demographically meaningful way into a single campaign, The advertising spots so combined provide access to a portion of the gaming audience that would normally be difficult to reach while providing access to large gamer populations for larger advertising campaigns.

Unfortunately, a significant amount of knowledge about the video game industry and more particularly about lesser known video game titles is required in order to meaningfully aggregate advertising spots to form a larger advertising campaign. Likely, it is easier to find people in the advertising industry with a broad knowledge of successful mass market video games than to find individuals with significant knowledge of less distributed titles.

Further, some advertisers prefer to select their target demographics with more specificity than others and, therefore, customization of any aggregation of advertising spots is desirable. That said, other advertisers are satisfied with a standard aggregation so long as metrics of reach, frequency, and demographics are available. Unfortunately, as noted above, it is difficult to find individuals with sufficient expertise to assist in aggregation efforts and more difficult when custom aggregation is desired.

Typically, an advertiser is well aware of their target demographic. The target demographic includes potential and existing customers of the advertiser and is typically determined through a process of market research. Often demographics are described based on age, sex and income. For example males between 18 and 35 with incomes over $50,000 per year. For broad demographics this is fine, but for microtargetting, often a demographic includes more qualitative information such as heterosexual males between 18 and 23 who are in university, drink beer and enjoy card games. The further restrictions on the demographic make it a smaller group.

For a product advertising aimed at a micro demographic, there are two common ways to target them. First, advertise in the broad demographic group including your target demographic and just view the additional group size as adding to the cost with the potential upsides of getting customers outside the demographic and getting customers inside the demographic who are not outwardly within the demographic. For example, some card players may only play online and in private. If they do not admit to playing cards, targeting them is more difficult as they are not admittedly part of the demographic in question. Alternatively, media specific to the demographic group—a banner at a University poker championship—assists in targeting the demographic. Unfortunately, these media specific to small demographic groups are difficult to justify for larger brands due to their small scale and often times ad hoc nature.

Referring to FIG. 1, a simplified flow diagram of a method of delivering an advertisement from within a video game is shown. A video game is executed at 101. The video game requests from a server advertising content for an advertising spot at 102. At 103, the advertising content is transmitted via the Internet to the video game platform. At 104, the game play reaches a point wherein the advertising spot is needed and the advertising content received via the Internet is inserted within the advertising spot and impressed upon the gamer. At 105, impression metrics are determined for the advertisement within the advertising spot and at 106, the impression metrics are reported to the server. At 107, the server reports the impression metrics against an advertising campaign.

Referring to FIG. 2, a method of aggregating advertising spots within video games is shown. At 201, an advertising campaign is provided for advertising at least partially within video games. A media planner plans media in which the advertising campaign is to be impressed upon consumers. As part of the media plan, a large number of in game advertising impressions is sought. As opposed to seeking one large release title, the media planner selects a preset group of a plurality of limited release video games each having similar advertising spots defined therein for carrying of the advertising campaign. For example, the predefined group is a group of video games from a same game provider. The plurality of limited release video game spots are aggregated into a single group for the advertising campaign.

Thus when a video game advertising spot of the plurality of limited release video game advertising spots is to be provided an advertisement 202, the advertisement is provided from the server for the campaign 203. Once impressed, the impression is reported 204. The impression is then reported against the advertising campaign 205. Optionally, a same advertising spot is aggregated within a plurality of different campaigns each with a different group of video games participating therein.

The aggregation is advantageous to the video game provider as a video game has a broader reach and more potential for advertising revenue. Conversely, the aggregation has disadvantages when a same video provider other than provides all of the video games within the aggregation. For example, it is unclear at the outset which of a plurality of aggregated video game titles is likely to garner a larger proportion of advertising revenues, if any. This depends on many factors. Since the advertising campaign likely specifies limitations such as reach and frequency caps and geographic restrictions, some video games may be underrepresented in the advertising revenue merely because of timing, geographic location of their customer base, etc. For a single video game the delivery of N impressions has a given value. The same is true for an aggregated group of video games. Unfortunately, the value is not always shared equally amongst the aggregated video games or in proportion to market share. Thus, frequency and reach capping affects the predictability of advertising revenue for some game providers.

Therefore, it would be advantageous to automate aggregation activities in order to facilitate multiple revenue sources for advertising spots and for video games.

Referring to FIG. 3, a simplified flow diagram of a method of aggregating advertising spots from within different video games and supporting custom aggregation is shown. At step 301, a video game is registered with an aggregation service. The video game provider supplies at 302 demographic data relating to garners known to play the video game. The demographic data is as specific or as general as the video game provider provides.

For each advertising spot within the game, data is provided including an advertising spot type—for example video, audio, texture, or object—and an advertising spot size and format. Further advertising spot related data is optionally provided.

At 303, the video game and its associated data are stored within an advertising spot database for searching thereof. The database is indexed on fields that are likely to be searched by advertisers. At 304, an advertiser wishing to advertise within an aggregated video game community invokes a search tool and searches for a target demographic—age, sex, and income—and optionally searches for further distinctive elements. The advertiser optionally chooses an aggregated community based on a final set of search terms. Alternatively, an aggregated community is selected based on search results culled manually by the advertiser. As such, aggregation is facilitated through a database of indices indicating demographic data relating to each title/spot.

At 305 when the aggregation is determined based on search terms, newly released titles relating to the search terms are automatically added to the aggregated community. When specific titles are selected, new video games are not automatically added to the aggregated community.

At 306 during execution of video games within the aggregated community, advertising content relating to the advertising campaign is provided from a server to a video game platform for being impressed upon a gamer playing the video game. At 307 impression data is reported to the server and at 308 the impression data is aggregated into the advertising campaign impression data and is reported. Thus, frequency and reach capping affects the predictability of advertising revenue for some game providers.

That said, because of the automated aggregation, it is likely that other advertising campaigns are better suited to advertising within those video games that were disproportionately represented in another advertising campaign. Further, the automated search feature is optionally a learning search tool that adapts search results in order to best monitise each video game to which advertising content is provided.

Referring to FIG. 4, a simplified flow diagram of a method of aggregating advertising spots from within different video games and supporting custom aggregation is shown. At step 401, a video game is registered with an aggregation service. The video game provider supplies at 402 demographic data relating to gamers known to play the video game. The demographic data is as specific or as general as the video game provider provides. Optionally, when the video game is released, reported geographic and game play data is used to update the game provider estimates within the database.

For each advertising spot within the game, data is provided including an advertising spot type—for example video, audio, texture, or object—and an advertising spot size and format. Further advertising spot related data is optionally provided.

At 403, the video game and its associated data is stored within an advertising spot database for searching thereof. The database is indexed on fields that are likely to be searched by advertisers. Optionally, the database is indexed on all fields. At 404, an advertiser wishing to advertise within an aggregated video game community invokes a search tool and searches for a target demographic—age, sex, and income—and optionally searches for further distinctive elements. At 405, the advertiser chooses a video game or a small set of video games based on the search results. Upon selecting an aggregated community with the selected titles, the system correlates the selected titles at 406 and forms search criteria for video games within the aggregated community. The search criteria are then applied in a similar fashion to the method of FIG. 2. Beneficially, if a video game meets the search criteria, its implementations on other hardware platforms when released will also meet the search criteria. As such, selecting a small set of newly released video games as the subset results in inclusion of future implementations of the same video games for other hardware platforms within the aggregated community. This greatly facilitates community management.

Optionally, the advertiser is notified automatically and preferably electronically about a list of video games within the aggregated community and any changes thereto. Alternatively, once a small number of video game titles are selected, the system proposes further titles and the advertiser elects to accept or reject each proposal.

Referring to FIG. 5, a simplified flow diagram of advertising campaign billing is shown. At 501, impression data is received from a first video game of a plurality of aggregated video games. The impression data is provided for reporting by a metrics analysis company 502. The impression data is also provided for reporting against the advertising campaign 503. The impression data is also provided for inclusion in reporting to a game provider of the first video game 504. Periodically, the advertiser is invoiced relating to landed impressions within their campaign 505. The money received is then distributed amongst the game providers in accordance with their reported impression counts relating to their video games 506.

Any impressions provided beyond reach and frequency caps are reported but remain unpaid. Alternatively, they are billed at a different rate. Further alternatively, they are billed and paid for.

Referring to FIG. 6, a simplified flow diagram of advertising campaign billing is shown. At 601, impression data is received from a first video game of a plurality of aggregated video games. The impression data is provided for reporting by a metrics analysis company 602. The impression data is also provided for reporting against the advertising campaign 603. The impression data is also provided for inclusion in reporting to a game provider of the first video game 604. Periodically, the advertiser is invoiced relating to landed impressions within their campaign. The money received is then distributed amongst the game providers in accordance with participation within the advertising campaign regardless of the landed impressions within their games 605. Optionally, game providers are paid a small bonus relating to actual landed impressions impressed from within their games. Since each game provider participating in the aggregation is paid, there is a stronger motivation to aggregate. Now, not only is there increased marketing power of a larger demographic population, but there are shared revenues even when insufficient advertising impressions are sold. Further, any impressions provided beyond reach and frequency caps are reported and paid as part of the overall share of the advertising campaign. Alternatively, each game provider is paid based on a percentage of landed impressions provided through their games such that those impressions beyond a reach and frequency cap are paid within the overall advertising campaign.

Referring to FIG. 7, shown is a simplified flow diagram of a method of approving content for use within an aggregation. Here, an advertiser selects just enough game titles for supporting their indicated demographic population at 701. At 702, content approval is sought from each game provider having a game within the aggregation. Until content approval is received from each game provider, there is no advertising campaign. When approval is received from each game provider, the campaign is set up and commenced 703. When approval is other than received, the advertising campaign is either modified or cancelled.

Referring to FIG. 8, shown is a simplified flow diagram of a method of approving content for use within an aggregation. Here, an advertiser selects enough game titles for supporting a demographic substantially larger than their indicated demographic population at 801. At 802, content approval is sought from each game provider having a game within the aggregation. Only a single content approval is required to start the advertising campaign 803. As such, with the first content approval, advertising content begins to be impressed upon gamers in approved video games. As approval is received from each game provider, their associated video games are added to the aggregation 804. When approval is other than received, the associated video game title is removed from the aggregation and the advertiser is notified 805.

Preferably, video games are characterized consistently for providing a most effective search results. This is optionally achieved by having the video game provider select from options to characterize the video game instead of providing them an opportunity to fill in data. Optionally, there is a further ability to fill in data for further or enhancing searching options.

Referring to FIG. 9, a method is shown for running a plurality of advertising campaigns across a plurality of aggregations. Here, an aggregation is formed for a large and widespread demographic 901. Advertising campaigns targeted for that large and widespread demographic are then set up 902. Because of the size of the game spot population, the aggregation supports many advertising campaigns. As such, a plurality of different advertising campaigns is provided across the aggregation allowing individual advertising content to be impressed upon many gamers playing many different games 903. The advertising content is then impressed upon gamers playing video games within the aggregation 904. These advertising campaigns are salable in bulk or in a commoditised fashion. When an advertiser ends a campaign, other advertising content for the aggregation is presented 905. In this fashion, the advertising campaigns act as an aggregation of advertising content for insertion within an aggregation of video games. For such a method, using a payment system in accordance with FIG. 6 is advantageous but the method of FIG. 5 is also useful.

Optionally, all video games are aggregated after their initial unique lifecycle is completed in order to monetise the games nearer an end of their lifecycle. Further optionally, games are insertable within large aggregations and removable therefrom at will since the large aggregations support many ad spots and a few more or less is not problematic. In this fashion, in game advertising begins to approach banner advertising on the Internet in terms of generic advertisements and generic advertising spots.

Alternatively, the present invention is used to monetise unsold advertising spots. Here, advertising spots remain unsold in a certain proportion. Thus, in a video game an advertising spot is, for example, 80% sold. The remaining 20% is placed into an aggregation and is therefore sold via the aggregation.

Of course, a same title or different titles in execution on different hardware platforms are aggregatable.

Referring to FIG. 10, shown is a simplified block diagram of a network. The network comprises an aggregation support server in the form of a broker server 1000. The broker server is in communication with a wide area network (WAN) in the form of the Internet 1010. To the Internet 1010 are coupled a plurality of gaming systems 1020 a through 1020 g including gaming systems having different hardware platforms and in execution of different games. Also coupled to the Internet 1010 is advertising server 1030.

A game in execution on gaming system 1020 b communicates with the broker 1000 and is informed of an advertising server 1030 for retrieving of advertising content therefrom. Typically, a plurality of advertising servers are in communication with the Internet 1010. To the video game system 1020 b, the advertising process is in accordance with other broker mediated advertising processes. That said, broker 1000 operates to aggregate video game advertising spots into aggregated communities of spots for delivering of advertising thereto. Broker 1000 supports addition of new aggregated advertising spots and removal of advertising spots from the community. Further, Broker 1000 acts to receive impression statistics and to report in accordance with the aggregation to the advertiser relating to the advertising campaign. Alternatively, reporting to the advertiser is performed by the advertising server. Of course, when reach and frequency caps are exceeded, the advertising server or the broker notifies the advertiser about a need to extend the advertising campaign.

Optionally, when a publisher publishes many video game titles, the publisher aggregates spots from each title into aggregated communities in order to drive some advertising traffic directed toward their best games, from an advertising perspective, to their other games. These aggregated communities are optionally distinct communities that are predefined.

It is preferable that loading of advertising content from a server to a system in execution of a video game other than impact game performance. As such, advertising content is preferably transferred as a low priority process or thread. Alternatively, advertising content is transferred when the video game system is idle such as when it is paused, when there is a change of level, when animations are being presented unrelated to game play, or when a game over or start game screen are being displayed. By downloading of advertising content when the game is other than in active execution, game performance remains unaffected and yet a substantial bandwidth is available throughout video game play.

Although the present invention has been described with respect to specific embodiments thereof, various changes and modifications are optionally carried out by those skilled in the art without departing from the scope of the invention. 

1. A method comprising: providing a plurality of in game advertising spots from different video games having similar demographic characteristics; grouping the plurality of in game advertising spots together into an aggregated community of advertising spots; and, delivering a same advertising content for display within each of the advertising spots within the aggregated community of advertising spots.
 2. A method according to claim 1 wherein the aggregated community is an aggregated community of advertising spots from a same game provider.
 3. A method according to claim 1 wherein the aggregated community is an aggregated community of advertising spots from different game providers.
 4. A method according to claim 1 wherein a same advertising spot within a video game is included in two different aggregated communities of advertising spots.
 5. A method according to claim 1 comprising reporting impression data of impressions formed by impressing the advertising content on gamers, the impression data reported as an aggregate to the advertiser.
 6. A method according to claim 1 comprising reporting impression data of impressions formed by impressing the advertising content on gamers, the impression data reported individually to a game provider.
 7. A method according to claim 1 comprising paying a game provider on a per impression basis, the game provider paid for impressions delivered from within video games of the game provider.
 8. A method according to claim 1 comprising paying a game provider on a per impression basis, the game provider paid for impressions delivered from within all video games of the aggregated community of advertising spots in proportion to an involvement of the video game within the community.
 9. A method according to claim 1 wherein the aggregated community of advertising spots includes advertising spots that in isolation were not sufficiently sold.
 10. A method according to claim 1 wherein the aggregated community of advertising spots includes advertising spots that are older than a predetermined age, the predetermined age relating to the lifecycle of a video game and beyond the initial “new” portion of the lifecycle of the video game.
 11. A method according to claim 10 wherein the predetermined time is six months.
 12. A method according to claim 1 comprising: automatically notifying a game provider of each video game having an advertising spot within the aggregated community of advertising spots of a proposed advertising content and requesting validation of said advertising content for being impressed upon a gamer from the video game having an advertising spot within the aggregated community of advertising spots.
 13. A method according to claim 1 comprising: notifying at least a game provider of at least a video game having an advertising spot within the aggregated community of advertising spots of a proposed advertising content and requesting validation of said advertising content for being impressed upon a gamer from the video game having an advertising spot within the aggregated community of advertising spots.
 14. A method according to claim 13 wherein validation of said same advertising content for an advertising spot is required prior to display of advertising content within said advertising spot.
 15. A method according to claim 14 wherein absent validation of said same advertising content for an advertising spot, the advertising spot is removed from the aggregated community of advertising spots.
 16. A method according to claim 13 wherein absent validation of said same advertising content for a predetermined number of advertising spots, the advertising content is other than displayed within advertising spots within the aggregated community of advertising spots.
 17. A method according to claim 1 comprising: providing a plurality of in game advertising content from different advertisers requesting similar demographic characteristics; grouping the plurality of in game advertising content together into an aggregated advertising campaign; and, delivering different advertising content for display within a same aggregated community of video game advertising spots to, in aggregate, fill an advertising campaign.
 18. A method comprising: registering a plurality of advertising spots from each of a plurality of video games, each advertising spot registered with data relating to an advertising spot format and demographic data relating to the video game in which the advertising spot is; forming a database of advertising spots, each advertising spot searchable based on the demographic data and the advertising spot format; and, searching the database to identify advertising spots having demographic data with a predetermined range.
 19. A method according to claim 18 comprising: grouping the plurality of in game advertising spots together into an aggregated community of advertising spots.
 20. A method according to claim 19 wherein grouping comprises: providing one or more video game advertising spots and forming a group based on advertising spots similar to the one or more video game advertising spots.
 21. A method according to claim 20 wherein new advertising spots registered after formation of the aggregated community are added to the aggregated community when they are sufficiently similar to the one or more video game advertising spots.
 22. A method according to claim 19 wherein grouping comprises: searching for at least a demographic criteria and forming a group based on advertising spots meeting the at least a demographic criteria.
 23. A method according to claim 22 wherein new advertising spots registered after formation of the aggregated community are added to the aggregated community when they have demographic data sufficiently similar to the search criteria.
 24. A method according to claim 19 wherein grouping comprises: searching for at least a demographic criteria and forming a group based selecting some of the advertising spots that meet the at least a demographic criteria.
 25. A method according to claim 1 comprising: providing advertising content for impressing upon a gamer from an advertising spot of the aggregated community of advertising spots; and, automatically notifying a game provider of each video game having an advertising spot within the aggregated community of advertising spots of a proposed advertising content and requesting validation of said advertising content for being impressed upon a gamer from the video game having an advertising spot within the aggregated community of advertising spots.
 26. A method according to claim 1 comprising: providing advertising content for impressing upon a gamer from an advertising spot of the aggregated community of advertising spots; and, notifying at least a game provider of at least a video game having an advertising spot within the aggregated community of advertising spots of a proposed advertising content and requesting validation of said advertising content for being impressed upon a gamer from the video game having an advertising spot within the aggregated community of advertising spots.
 27. A method according to claim 26 wherein validation of said same advertising content for an advertising spot is required prior to display of advertising content within said advertising spot.
 28. A method according to claim 27 wherein absent validation of said same advertising content for an advertising spot, the advertising spot is removed from the aggregated community of advertising spots.
 29. A method according to claim 26 wherein absent validation of said same advertising content for a predetermined number of advertising spots, the advertising content is other than displayed within advertising spots within the aggregated community of advertising spots.
 30. A method according to claim 18 comprising: providing a plurality of in game advertising content from different advertisers requesting similar demographic characteristics; grouping the plurality of in game advertising content together into an aggregated advertising campaign; and, delivering different advertising content for display within a same aggregated community of advertising spots to, in aggregate, fill a single advertising campaign.
 31. A method comprising: providing a plurality of in game advertising content from different advertisers requesting similar demographic characteristics; grouping the plurality of in game advertising content together into an aggregated advertising campaign; and, delivering different advertising content for display within a same video game advertising spot to, in aggregate, fill an advertising campaign. 